S K SHARMA Vs. STATE OF HARYANA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE petitioner is aggrieved by the order dated 9. 9. 1991, Annexure P-4 to the writ petition whereby the powers of Food Inspector conferred upon him have been withdrawn.

(2.) THE facts giving rise to the filing of the present petition are as under:the petitioner was working as a Sanitary Inspector in the Health Department when he was conferred the additional powers of Food Inspector vide notification dated 9. 6. 1977, issued under the provisions of Sub-section (i) of Section 9 of he Prevention of Food Adulteration Act, 1954, read with Rule 8 of the Prevention of Food Adulteration Rules, 1955 (hereinafter referred to us the Rules' ). The State of Haryana thereafter, refrained its policy with regard to the appointment of Food Inspectors and this Policy was communicated to respondent No. 2, the Director General Health Services, Haryana, Chandigarh, vide letter dated 25. 6. 1984. The appointment of the petitioner as Food Inspector was made afresh under this Policy and the powers were conferred on him vide notification dated 203. 1985. A copy of this notification has been appended as Annexure P-1 to the writ petition. This notification was rescinded by die notification dated 9. 9. 1992, Annexure P-4 to the petition. The case of the petitioner primarily is that before the powers of Food Inspector could be taken away from him, he was entitled to a hearing and that the powers having been conferred under the Act, could not be taken away by a mere notification. It has also been averred that as the impugned notification did not assign any reasons for the action taken against the petitioner, it amounted to an exercise of unbridled and arbitrary power and could not be sustained.

(3.) WE have heard the learned counsel for the parties and find no merit in this petition. It is the conceded case that the powers of Food Inspector were conferred on the petitioner by virtue of the policy dated 25. 6. 1984. The petitioner was accordingly bound by the policy in its entirety. In this policy it had been clearly set out that the Food Powers conferred on a Tehsil Sanitary Inspector were liable to be withdrawn in case some strictures had been passed against him by the Court. We have seen from the portion of the judgment quoted above that strictures had been passed against the petitioner and the Court had even recommended departmental action against him and as such the action taken was fully warranted. It has been conceded before us that no action was taken by the petitioner at any stage to have these remarks of the Chief Judicial Magistrate expunged by a higher Court and in this view of the matter, they are deemed to have been accepted by the petitioner. Faced with this situation, Mr. Bansal, the learned counsel for the petitioner cited a number of judgments of this court to contend that the remarks made by the Chief Judicial Magistrate were not called for as the petitioner had fully complied with all the statutory formalities enjoined upon him by the Act and the Rules when he took the Food sample. This argument too is unacceptable in the face of the subsisting Order of the Court. In this situation there is, no merit in the arguments of the learned counsel for the petitioner that before taking any action against the petitioner he should have been heard.